Gospel: January 23, 2016

Mk 3:20-21

They went home. The crowd began to gather again and they couldn’t even have a meal. Knowing what was happening, his relatives came to take charge of him. “He is out of his mind,” they said.

REFLECTION

The people closest to Jesus (in terms of blood connection), namely, his relatives, said about him, as we learn in today’s gospel reading: “He is out of his mind.” Well, that is not too surprising, for many a great man was mis­understood and unappre­ciated by his own family. But, something much more serious, Jesus was mis­understood by his own disciples. Sometimes he is so frustrated by their obtuseness that his patience breaks down. On one occasion, for example, he shows his exasperation with these words: “Do you not ­understand or comprehend? Are your hearts hardened? Do you have eyes and not see, ears and not hear? And do you not remember, when I broke the five loaves for the five thousand, how many wicker baskets full of fragments you picked up?” They answered him, “Twelve.” “When I broke the seven loaves for the four thousand, how many full baskets of fragments you did you pick up?” They answered, “Seven.” He said to them, “Do you still not understand?” (Mk 8, 17-21)

Jesus suffered that special form of loneliness which is to be mis­understood.